Outdoor gasoline powered yard maintenance and recreational vehicles, lawn mowers in particular, consume a significant proportion of overall U.S. gasoline used during the summer months, thus increasing pollutants significantly, and adding to U.S. dependence on foreign oil. This has undesirable impacts on the U.S. ecology, economy, world perception of the U.S. and on national policy objectives. Attempts to sell battery-powered electric lawn mowers and other battery powered lawn care devices have had only limited success. Wider adoption of battery-powered electric appliances has been inhibited primarily by the inconvenience of short operating duration and long recharge times that result from the design dilemma of choosing the size or number of batteries possible without exceeding the weight and cost constraints inherent in current technology and designs.
There is a need in the art of battery powered outdoor mobile devices for a power solution that extends operating duration of cordless electric appliances such as lawn equipment, thereby reducing a deterrent to quicker and more widespread adoption of mobile electric lawn equipment to replace gasoline powered lawn equipment. Furthermore, there is a need in the art of battery powered appliances to reduce power requirements and acquire new energy at a rate somewhat less than the rate of energy consumption, thus extending the operating time until energy depletion occurs.